Japanese architect Kisho Kurokawa designed a utopian vision interweaving the city and nature. Three years after his death, his vision is complete. Rowan More of the Observer pays Astana, the new capital, a visit.
Rowan asks, "...can a city, in all its teeming complexity, really be planned? Or does the attempt lead only to a synthetic simulacrum, a kind-of city that is not quite the real thing?"
Nonetheless, Rowan is surprised by the boldness of Kurokawa's vision:
"To look at, Astana is so strange that it has one grasping for images. It's a space station, marooned in an ungraspable expanse of level steppe, its name (to English speakers) having the invented sound of a science fiction writer's creation. It's a city of fable or dream, as recounted by Marco Polo to Kublai Khan."
FULL STORY: Astana, Kazakhstan: the space station in the steppes
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Pennsylvania Mall Conversion Bill Passes House
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U.S. Supreme Court: California's Impact Fees May Violate Takings Clause
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Dallas Surburb Bans New Airbnbs
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Divvy Introduces E-Bike Charging Docks
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Barrett Planning Group LLC
HUD's Office of Policy Development and Research
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HUD's Office of Policy Development and Research
Tufts University, Department of Urban and Environmental Policy & Planning
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ULI Northwest Arkansas
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